A letter to Rev Stephen Sizer
We are pleased to publish below a letter sent last week by one of our supporters to the Rev. Stephen Sizer, one of the leaders of the divestment campaign:
Dear Rev Dr Sizer
Having lived in the past for eight years in Israel, two of which were spent in the Palestinian Arab village of Bet Fajeh, Biblical Bethpage, I was interested to read on the internet your thoughts concerning the action of the EIAG in overruling Synod’s call for disinvestment in Caterpillar and of your desire for another meeting of the Synod on this matter.
I admit from the outset that I do see the return of the Jewish people to the land of Israel from my Bible, and when I first became aware of this, it caused a crisis of faith for me. I could not understand how the God who loved me so much that He sent His Son the Lord Jesus Christ to die for my salvation could cruelly make any nation refugees simply to return the Jewish people to the land. I prayed about the matter and decided to start investigating this very complex and painful situation.
I will say honestly that my first action was to contact the Embassy of Israel asking for any information they could give, having only heard the Palestinian side from the press. I am aware of the diary of the Scottish Christian minister Robert Murray McCheyne who visited Palestine in the early nineteenth century and recorded his impressions. I have also read “The Innocents Abroad” by Mark Twain, in which he describes a visit made to a number of countries including Palestine in the mid eighteen hundreds. They both describe a neglected land in which there was much disease, malarial infested swamps, a few Jews and a few Arabs, and a land in which you could travel for miles and hardly meet a soul. There are some whose families have been there for hundreds of years, but it is obvious when you listen to neutral eyewitnesses that there has been a lot of immigration on both sides. The area was a neglected backwater of the Turkish Empire for four hundred years, but I am sure I do not have to relate to you the history up until the time of the British Mandate and after. I will say though that in violation of the UN Partition Plan of 1947, following the war of independence, Jordan occupied the West Bank and Egypt occupied Gaza, and neither of those two countries gave the Palestinian Arabs a homeland. Both Jordan and Egypt as I am sure you are aware, occupied those lands until 1967, Jordan even annexing the West Bank in 1950 and not relinquishing sovereignty over it until the late eighties. And the camps were still in existence in 1967. Why? My heart goes out to the Palestinian Arab people and I know some fine ones. But let us not make the mistake of believing that their suffering is entirely Israel’s fault. Israel also has suffered and is suffering. I am not going to say that Palestinian Arabs are not at times abused by soldiers, I have known it to happen. I was personally in a crowd of Palestinians when a mounted police officer charged at us for no reason. But it is not the norm.
I have sat on the roof of a family home in the Deir El Balah refugee camp in Gaza after the nightly curfew when the IDF was patrolling that area. I have known the frustration of people whose lives were disrupted and who could not venture onto the streets at night. I have also sat and cried with a Jewish family whose daughter wife and mother had just suddenly been killed in a terror attack. I have also looked into the face of security guards whilst entering shops or restaurants and realised that should a suicide bomber attack, that man would be the last line of defence between me and either maiming or death and that he could well pay for it with his life. Yes, I did notice that life seemed to be quite a bit more normal in Jerusalem after the security fence was built, and I also realise that it saves lives on both sides, the life of the would be bomber if he cannot get through, plus the lives of the would be victims. And surely the saving of life is paramount. No, I don’t like the bulldozing of homes, but I also know about the tunnels which were believed to be in some of them and the weapons smuggling. I long and pray for both the Jewish people and the Palestinian Arab people to come to know the One who loves them so much that He gave His life for their salvation and for ours. I don’t know if you are aware of it, but in Islamic fundamentalist thought, for an area that has been under Islamic control to be lost to the control of another group is considered an insult to Allah, and there lies the problem, because for four centuries Israel was under the control of the Ottoman Turks. As the Bible says, we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities and powers and spiritual wickedness in high places. Eph 6:12. This battle is not Jew versus Arab but rather the false god of the Qur’an versus the One True God, the false prophet Mohammed versus the Lord Jesus Christ. But I am an optimist regarding this situation because the Lord Jesus Christ defeated the enemy two thousand years ago on that glorious Cross. If there is to be a second debate in the Synod, then I do hope and pray that this time all sides of the story are allowed a voice. I also hope that if a delegation do visit the land that they also pay a visit to Christ Church in the Old City of Jerusalem, a fellowship which prays for both Israel and the Palestinian Arabs. I think they also need to hear for themselves why these brothers and sisters who live in the land have distanced themselves from the Synod’s decision. I enclose a copy of their statement issued on the 9th of February.
May you have a blessed Easter. Christ has risen indeed.
Sincerely in Him,
V H Sealey (Ms)
